Covid-19: Contact-tracing App

Lord Fowler Excerpts

Wednesday 6th May 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bethell]

I reassure the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, that sunset arrangements will form part of the conditions of the app and that they will be published shortly.

[The Lord Speaker (Lord Fowler)]

My Lords, the time allowed for this Question has now elapsed.

Covid-19: Personal Protective Equipment

Lord Fowler Excerpts

Thursday 23rd April 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bethell]

The noble Baroness is right to champion this point. The Cleveland Clinic is known to us. I will ensure that it is played into the task force that is working on both the regulations and practicalities of reuse.

[The Lord Speaker]

My Lords, that concludes the Virtual Proceedings on Oral Questions. Thank you very much, questioners and Ministers. The Virtual Proceedings will resume at 12.15 pm for the Private Notice Question in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Smith of Basildon.

Covid-19: Extent of Infection

Lord Fowler Excerpts

Wednesday 22nd April 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bethell]

My noble friend Lord Dobbs is entirely right to put his finger on this important matter. The CMO was clear from the very beginning that Britain’s mortality rate came as much from Covid as from non-Covid deaths. We review this situation regularly and thoroughly, and we will be glad to update the House at a future date. We are very conscious of the threat of which my noble friend speaks.

[The Lord Speaker (Lord Fowler)]

Supplementary question: the noble Lord, Lord Krebs. Lord Krebs? No? In that case, I call the noble Lord, Lord Hain.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Bethell]

The noble Lord raises a completely valid point on the accessibility of drive-in centres. They suit some people but not all, as he rightly points out. That is why we have brought in at-home testing arrangements, delivered mainly by Amazon. They started on Monday, and we are very ambitious for both their scale and their scope, particularly for the demographics of which he speaks.

[The Lord Speaker]

Supplementary question: the noble Baroness, Lady Lawrence of Clarendon. Lady Lawrence? No? I call the noble Lord, Lord Moynihan, for his supplementary question.

[Lord Moynihan (Con)]

Over 90% of the population will be unlikely to have suffered from Covid-19 when the restrictions are lifted. Will the Government therefore initiate and support a nationwide fitness and recreation campaign, given that physical exercise can help ensure that immune systems become stronger and less susceptible to infections and their most severe consequences and lead to a greater ability to recover from infections?

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Bethell]

Serology tests provide important data on the behaviours of the virus. We still do not fully understand what kind of immunity and antibody response will be long-lasting in the body. There are mysteries to this virus that are yet to be solved; serology tests are vital to that and they can play a part in the back-to-work strategy. However, I would remind him that it is a tiny proportion of the population—probably around 5%— who have antibodies. We cannot put the economy back on its feet with just 5% of the population.

[The Lord Speaker]

My Lords, I am afraid that the time allowed for this Question has elapsed. Two noble Lords were not called; I am sure that this will be taken into account in future lists.

Covid-19: Medically Vulnerable People

Lord Fowler Excerpts

Wednesday 22nd April 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bethell]

The noble Lord makes a very reasonable request. I have sought clarification from the department on this point, because his suggestion seems eminently reasonable, and as soon as I have a reply I will write to him and share the contents with the Library.

[The Lord Speaker (Lord Fowler)]

My Lords, I regret that the time allowed for this Question has elapsed. I apologise to the few people at the end of the list who have not managed to get in. We will seek to deal with that in the allocation for future Questions.

Covid-19: Removal of Restrictions

Lord Fowler Excerpts

Tuesday 21st April 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bethell]

The noble Baroness is entirely right. Tracking and tracing will be absolutely essential for keeping down R0, the transmission rate, when it comes to the implementation of our medium-term strategy. We are working extremely hard to dramatically increase our testing capacity. I assure the House that that capacity is growing enormously, at scale and exponentially. It is our expectation that it will easily meet the requirements of tracking and tracing. That tracking and tracing will be implemented by several work streams. The app already unveiled will be an important part of that, as will the PHE manual contact-tracing resources and the use of any other technological advances and innovations developed as part of this response to the epidemic.

[The Lord Speaker (Lord Fowler)]

Lord Mackay of Clashfern. No? Okay, we will go on. Lord Patel.

[Lord Patel (CB)]

Noble Lords cannot see me, but I hope they can hear me. One of the five conditions the Government have set themselves before any changes will be made to the current lockdown is that they will have to be confident that there will not be a second wave of infection. What scientific evidence will the Government need in support of this decision, and what role will population-based serology testing play in this decision?

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Bethell]

The noble Lord is entirely right. I commend the colleagues from all the nations with whom I have been working over the last month. One of the most singular and impressive aspects of the response to Covid-19 has been the way in which the four nations have worked together. I am enormously grateful to my colleagues for the consistent, collaborative and helpful approach that has characterised this response. Geographical difference is the kind of subject that the CMO will give us advice on. This is, naturally, a huge concern to those who feel that they might be left behind, but the CMO will provide the best advice and we will follow the science.

[The Lord Speaker]

My Lords, I afraid that the time allowed for Questions has now elapsed. I thank all noble Lords who have contributed to the first Oral Questions session by way of a Virtual Proceeding. As the noble Lord, Lord Baker, said, it shows that we can hold the Government to account in different ways. We will, doubtless, get better at it as the weeks go by, but this was a very important beginning and the information that came out was valuable. I thank all noble Lords and apologise to those who did not get to speak. That brings the Virtual Proceeding to an end.

Health: Eating Disorders

Lord Fowler Excerpts

Tuesday 7th January 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Blackwood of North Oxford]

My Lords—[Interruption.]

I am getting some help from the other side.

The noble Baroness is quite right on this matter. It is vital that professionals are trained to look out for potential signs. Obviously, with such a deadly mental illness—

I am not sure whether to stop or carry on.

Diagnosing eating disorders is an important area of mental health practice, so Health Education England is taking forward a significant package of work at the moment to review current education and training offered to identify gaps and ensure that not only junior doctors but general practitioners and nurses have the right kind of training.

[The Lord Speaker (Lord Fowler)]

My Lords, we now come to a number of First Readings. It might be helpful to the House if Members were kind enough to switch off their mobile phones before coming into the Chamber.

Blood Safety and Quality (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019

Lord Fowler Excerpts

Wednesday 19th December 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab Co-op)]

Object.

[The Lord Speaker (Lord Fowler)]

Then we will take the first Motion on the blood safety regulations.

NHS England: Pre-exposure Prophylaxis for People at Risk of HIV

Lord Fowler Excerpts

Tuesday 7th June 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Prior of Brampton]

As I said in response to the earlier question, this is really not about the efficacy of the drug. There is evidence that it is very efficient; that will be confirmed or otherwise by the extra work done by PHE. It is purely a question of the independent legal advice given to NHS England that it does not have the power to commission this drug.

[Lord Fowler (Con)]

The independent advice seems extremely curious and the Minister should go into more detail, because surely we are past the stage of needing a pilot. The international evidence on PrEP is overwhelming. Is not the underlying fear here that policy on HIV has gone off the boil, in spite of the fact that prevention measures such as this are good in both human and financial terms?

[Lord Prior of Brampton]

All I can say in response is that NHS England has had independent legal advice that it does not have the power to commission this particular drug for this particular purpose, and for this purpose the drug itself is not yet licensed. It is not to do with any decision made on efficacy grounds for this drug; it is purely that they have received independent legal advice.

Health and Social Care: State Pension

Lord Fowler Excerpts

Thursday 21st January 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Prior of Brampton]

The NHS plan is for the whole five-year period—the lifetime of this Parliament. It was signed up to by all the arm’s-length bodies within the NHS. The Government support that plan and are front-loading the financing to support the plan as well, so we believe that the plan is achievable.

[Lord Fowler (Con)]

Is not the key point exactly the one that has just been made? We are talking not about the five-year plan but about the years that come after that and how you get a National Health Service which can be financed over the long term. Surely that is what we should also be looking at, apart from the Government’s own plan.

National Health Service

Lord Fowler Excerpts

Thursday 14th January 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Fowler (Con)]

My Lords, I did not agree with everything that the noble Lord said, but I congratulate him on how he set out the pressures that the health service faces and will face in future. As he forecast, it is for reasons like that that I advocate a royal commission to examine the future financial—and I emphasise financial—requirements of the health service and propose ways in which that demand can be met. My proposal has absolutely nothing to do with the current industrial dispute. Indeed, I suspect that the BMA would not be a natural supporter of such an independent investigation. Basically, I want a commission to investigate how we can continue to afford a National Health Service providing care irrespective of income, which is what everyone in all parties wants, while recognising the financial challenges of an ageing population and the extra cost involved in medical advance. At the same time, we must recognise that public spending on health should not crowd out all other areas. I also want to see good education, a strong police service and—if noble Lords are interested, we are debating this subject next Thursday at about the same time—better prisons. If this is not an intrusion into private grief, I want a strong defence policy as well.

It is against that background that I would set out four requirements for a royal commission. First, it should be absolutely independent; it should be neither a political body nor an insider body. Secondly, it should look at how we finance the health service, otherwise there is absolutely no point. What we want are the best ideas on financing a service that we all value, irrespective of party, and we should re-examine old policies—for example, policies such as prescription charges, which mean at the moment that 90% of prescriptions are prescribed free. Thirdly, a royal commission should look at all the options; it should certainly examine experience, particularly in other countries of Europe, but it should investigate the potential of a health tax—a ring-fenced contribution to the costs of healthcare, which would have the advantage of connecting the taxpayer much more closely to the cost of the health service that they finance.

Fourthly, and lastly—and personally I regard this as crucial—a royal commission should investigate the long-term savings and benefit of better public health. Both Governments have failed here. The national health basically remains a sickness service, not because that is what Health Ministers want but because that is what the Treasury allows. The Treasury will try to provide resources for treating the casualties, but it is very reluctant to invest in preventing those casualties. It says that you cannot show that it will work, when the evidence is clear that prevention policies can and do work, not least in the 1986 AIDS campaign, which reduced not only HIV but all other sexual diseases at the same time. Even worse than this general failure is the fact that the Treasury has now chosen public health as the one area in the whole of the health field where spending is to be reduced, which is an entirely retrograde step.

There is a vast amount to do, and what we do now has implications for years to come. I believe that a royal commission has the potential to provide a proper base on which to face the financial challenges and to win public support.